So I get my car up and running in a nice daily driver kind of way. Very traditional '28 model A Tudor. Heading home from work today I notice the idiot light for the charging system is on (everyone mocked me and my lights that I used in addition to gauges) I look down, oh #%!$ only 12 volts on the gauge, oh oh, water temp is 180+, it's never over 160. I peek out the windshield, oh man, the belt ain't spinning, nothing good can come from this. A quick kill the flathead and pull off the road and I find that the lower crank pulley has come apart, the front, pressed and welded half came loose. Maybe a road box is in order. Son is on the way with tools, glad my kids live close by so we can help each other out. Cliff
I've seen a few of those come apart before. Gonna be a fight getting another one installed in that close area. good luck
My car wouldn't start on Saturday at the local hang out. Nobody was around until we broke out a set of jumper cables. All of the sudden people gathered around like I was preparing to start a Top/Fuel car! Sheesh! I wanted crawl under a rock! Like nobody's ever seen a Ford broke down before!
That looks like a clean separation, you should be able to press it back together and re weld it.........just a pita to get at by the look of it................
Limped it home, no problem. I just need to pull the mount bolts and jack it up some and the pulley will slide right out. I agree. Press it on, check it for being square on the lathe and weld it back together. Gonna start a list on my wall board of the times it craps out, just because. Cliff
Not fun at the time but great stories and memories develop from breakdowns. You don't get them driving a Prius.
Whenever my dad and I would suffer a mechanical failure on the road he would remind me......."It's a good thing we're not in the used airplane racket".
Wellll!!!! I'm glad we got that out of the way. You got lucky, in '02 I snagged a deuce (survivor) off the side of I-435 in Wyandot County that had the lower pulley come apart catastrophically, hit the fan knocked a blade off which lodged itself in the original Henry radiator. I fixed his rad for him and we found the rest of the stuff in my junk box and got him back on the road. OK its not about me, like I said you got lucky. Evidently that happens although it is only the second that I have seen in about 45 years of rodding. Something I meant to mention about idiot lights. A lot of professional race cars have lights as well as gauges, easier to notice a problem when a light comes on then to constantly be checking the gauges as well as driving it like you stole it.
Doesn't that just officialy make it a real Hot Rod? Completly hand built cat, lot's of Old Used parts. I think it's part of the tradition. Seems to happen to all of us if we actually drive them. That's pretty minor in the scope of things. The Wizzard
Good to go, back on the road. It's all in good fun (if your into that sitting on the side of the road thing) and it adds to the enjoyment of the car by giving you great stories to tell, like the fire, been there once. Cliff Ramsdell
IF you cannot fix your car on the side of the road, you'd best not drive far from home...!!! Had to change a set of points in my bro's stock 331" in his '54 Cadillac in Sand Point, Idaho two weeks ago after our trip to Spokane, Washington, for the GoodGuy's event...only thing I had was a folded dollar bill to set the gap in the points...it fired up first time and ran fine the rest of the trip (nearly 4,000 miles)...!!! R-
Ancient Chinese proverb.. "man who plays with old cars and thinks they will never break down is delusional......"
The Jalopy Journal
